September 21

Faint, yet pursuing — Judg 8:4

It is a great thing thus to learn to depend upon God to work through our feeble resources, and yet, while so depending, to be absolutely faithful and diligent, and not allow our trust to deteriorate into supineness and indolence. We find no sloth or negligence in Gideon, or his three hundred; though they were weak and few, they were wholly true, and everything in them ready for God to use to the very last. Faint yet pursuing was their watchword as they followed and finished their glorious victory, and they rested not until the last of their enemies were destroyed, and even their false friends were punished for their treachery and unfaithfulness.

So God still calls the weakest instruments, but when He chooses and enables them they are no longer weak, but mighty through God, and faithful through His grace to every trust and opportunity; trusting, as Dr. Chalmers used to say, as though all depended upon God, and working as though all depended upon themselves.

Teach me, my blessed Master, to trust and obey.